Narrowboat Alacrity

The weekend saw most of the remaining bits finished leaving a small amount of scotia to fit and the varnishing to do……I even managed to service the engine…… with loads needed to be done at home before the holiday, it was a flying visit.

I thought that I would have finished by now but its all the small fiddley things that take the time. Work tends to get in the way as usual. The weather has been so bad that I’m having to cut most of the plywood in the galley area……..lots of mess…..

So what am I left with to do…………well there is two sets of cupboard doors to hang, the brackets for the folding chairs to make and fit, loads of sanding and varnishing and the tv surround and shelves to make and fit (those can wait……..) I will sand and varnish while we are on holiday.

I have been watching a boy fishing on the next pontoon in the marina, he hauled out a reasonable sized perch and on his next cast pulled out a very large and angry crayfish……..his mum said it was destined for a sandwich………………………

As I was carrying some timber back to the landrover I spotted NB Debdale passing under Butchers Bridge……..so only one weekend left before our holiday………………and an engine service to do………. 

Well that time has come around again………….. Yes Insurance time………..

I have always had the ” Fully Comprehensive ” insurance for Alacrity. Her first policy was with Michael Stimpson, real personal service. Then he merged with Mardon Marine who are now part of Towergate. Up until now I have not changed my brokers………..so what made you change I hear you ask……..Well when I looked at how my premium was put together I found that first there was the actual insurance cost plus an arrangement fee then get this a voluntary donation to their charity………….there was a note later on saying that I could deduct the charitable amount if I wanted to.

My view is that they had no right to add this amount even though I could elect not to pay it, It is the assumption that annoyed me. I regularly give to charities that I choose to support and donate items to charity shops.

I don’t like tin wavers or people who accost you in shopping precincts and try to shame you into donating.

I will donate to who I choose, an amount I choose, and at a time I choose…………………………………………….             

I now insure through Craftinsure online ……………………

My cupboard doors have come on well and have had their first coat of varnish. it’s perfect weather for varnishing or so I thought, i’d forgotten to factor in the Thunderbugs

The itching on my neck should have warned me……………….I only turned away for a few moments and the little b*****s had started their own synchronised swimming team on my newly varnished doors………………..

I’ve allways hated them one even got into my flat screen monitor and wandered about like a disembodied apostrophe even highlighting it and hitting the delete key didn’t work.

Oh well back to the sandpaper and midnight varnishing………………………………………

I Started to make the swing out support for the saloon table today, using up some of the timber we removed from the dinette. I have to admit I pinched the idea from a picture in “Waterways World” with a few innovations of my own. My Idea of using a caravan type leg foundered with all hands, as when the table was down it would imprison one of the diners.

The main problem was edging the raw board, getting thin strip dark hardwoods is almost impossible locally so I had to machine some up from larger stock. The DeWalt band saw I inherited from my father is working overtime not bad for a thirty year old bit of kit.

To make best use of space we decided to fit a folding dropdown table to the saloon side of the galley bulkhead. This will give us somewhere separate to eat, use the laptop play cards etc.

I had already cut the old table to a suitable length but was having problems thinking of a support to make it stable.

I saw this leg for a caravan table on ebay for £12 so I thought I would try it, if its not suitable I can always bung it back on ebay. and as for chairs we chose these from IKEA.

With seat pads these are comfortable and stow away easily in a small space.

So far with the refit I have fitted eight packs of solid Oak flooring (Twelve Sq metres) using three litres of Evostik PVA adhesive.

Before I get told off Jo did all the matching of lengths so the overlaps and colouring looked right (she’s good at jigsaws).

We had planned to fit the flooring in the Saloon, Galley, Corridor and Bedroom……………………….

but little unforeseen things happen…….I forgot about under the fridge…….how would we get it out if I floored up to it………so we removed the fridge and I fitted the floor into the recess but now the fridge was too tall to fit so I had to replace the wooden battens which support the worksurface with steel angle supports ……..the fridge now fits again.

“John”………err….yes?……………wouldn’t it look nice if we had wood flooring in the bathroom……………..

The bathroom now has a fantastic looking floor. A lot of time was taken cutting and fitting the planks to allow for the expansion gaps which were filled with cork strip and will be conceled with oak scotia strip to finish it off. The other time consuming bit was rehanging the sliding doors in the bathroom and bedroom and adjusting the track so it ran free. At the rear of the bedroom I have fitted a trapdoor to allow me to remove any water that accumilates at the lowest point of the cabin bilge ( there has been non to remove in 19 years ) and to enable me to adjust the trim with more lead ballast.

Where the L shaped part of the dinette was I have fitted a cupboard and bookshelves, which as you see Jo has already started to use. I plan to fit the doors next week and re varnish the saloon sometime in the next few weeks.

Having just read Lesley K’s post about her new washing machine not fitting on Caxton reminded me about when I changed the fridge on Alacrity. The original fridge was an Electrolux RM360 gas, 12 volt and mains which was seriously losing its will to chill.

Taking careful measurements of where the new fridge was to go and of the size of the front door I visited John Lewis in Welwyn Garden City. Tape measure in hand I measured up all their fridges……………(The staff were very helpful to an obvious lunatic muttering and measuring) and yes I found one, a Lec, perfect fit……………………..

Guess what I hadn’t taken into account……….the curvature of the bow, on Alacrity the front door is set to the right and not in the center………………………Oops…….every way we tried to get the fridge through the door the bow curvature caused it to catch on something.!!!! the air turned blue even the ducks blushed………….later after removing the front door, the door frame and some interior trim we got it in. There was only just enough space to tape some paper to protect the paint.

I also nearly came unstuck last week when I was laying the new oak plank floor…… space above fridge 15mm oak plank thickness 18mm. the result was I had to remove two wooden support battens and replace them with angle brackets to keep the ventilation space………….I told Jo that I had calculated for that……and yes, she didn’t believe me either……………someone was looking down on me favourably that day…….

Well I have just got back after a week working on Alacrity’s refit. I took everything I needed with me or so I thought but forgot my laptop so be prepared for an avalanche of posts.

Against my better judgement (I was so stiff I couldn’t make it up the hill to the Plough) we took a slow walk along the towpath to the Mill House which as you have seen in a previous post I was rather scathing about, BUT!!! they must have listened………….. The service was much improved despite the ongoing problems with the cold water supply because of the CryptoSpyridium found in the water supplied by Anglia Water.

The food order arrived in a very reasonable time and on Hot!!! plates no problems with the quality and taste.

Just one gripe the draught Bass was off again but on talking to the manager I found that he has to boil up eight gallons of water to clean the pipes, so fair comment with the ongoing water problems, I would prefer to have a decent pint than a poor one from unclean pipes.